When you’re watching your favourite show you may forget what went into making it and the large budgets that were set to bring it to your screen.

Some TV shows such as Game of Thrones, we expect to have a large budget which it did, of $15 million per episode by season 8. The show's success is shown in how much they made.

There have been some unexpectedly expensive shows to produce recently and each season tends to increase in price as the show gains popularity and expects to be even better for the next seasons.

4 of the most expensive shows

Benchmark oil prices reached their highest level in five months on Wednesday as hundreds of US offshore oil facilities were closed in preparation for the arrival of Hurricane Laura.

310 facilities in the Gulf of Mexico were evacuated, effectively halting 84% of oil production in the Gulf – equivalent to a loss of 1.56 million barrels per day – and at least a third of synthetic rubber capacity in the US. The scale of the shutdown is comparable to the 90% production outage caused by Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

The news pushed oil futures contracts to their highest prices since early March, before the US and other nations first implemented lockdown measures in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Brent crude rose 0.4% to $46.05 per barrel in early Wednesday trading, and West Texas Intermediate rose 0.2% to $43.43 per barrel.

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According to Reuters, AxiCorp’s chief global markets strategist Stephen Innes commented: "Markets are currently pricing in a possible near-term catastrophic gasoline shortage."

Hurricane Laura is expected to make landfall on Thursday near the Texas-Louisiana border, where many petrochemical plants and refineries are situated. The National Hurricane Centre predicts that it will be a major hurricane with wind speeds of at least 111 miles per hour by time of landfall.

This has stemmed from the fact that in recent years, diesel has come in for a lot of scrutiny recently due to the levels of Nitrogen Oxide our vehicles emit. So much so that the government in the UK proposed plans to ban any sales of new diesel and petrol vehicles by 2040 as they try to clean the nation’s air quality.

We are currently being encouraged to make the transition over to electric and hybrid vehicles, but just what effect will this have on traditional fuel sources? Lookers, who offer a variety of car servicing plans, explore what the future of fuel looks like for the UK.

Will the prices of fuel fluctuate?

The reported on the yo-yo affair of fuel prices in the UK and noted a number of influencing factors. Brexit and harmful emissions to UAE conflict, have meant that fuel prices haven’t been steady for some time now – and a plan to eliminate petrol and diesel cars will not help steady the cost of fuel either.

After witnessing a three-year high in how much petrol and diesel was costing on the UK’s forecourts, the RAC and other industry experts have encouraged supermarkets to reduce their fuel prices to make the public be able to afford the fuel type. At the start of 2018, three of the UK’s leading supermarkets had listened to the RAC’s call for lower fuel prices, and reduced fuel prices by up to 2p per litre as of February 2018.

RAC fuel spokesman, Simon Williams, stated: “Both petrol and diesel are now at their highest points for more than three years which is bound to be making a dent in household budgets.”

“Both petrol and diesel are now at their highest points for more than three years which is bound to be making a dent in household budgets.”

In 2014, the OPEC made a decision to increase the level of domestic fuel production in the UK, which led to a price drop to 98p in January 2016 — the lowest price of fuel per litre since the financial crisis in 2009. However, the UK still heavily relies on imported energy and fuel – around 38% of the UK’s total energy consumption is reliant on imported energy. Could our trading relationships be at risk after Brexit? And, of course, we must also consider how the uncertainty around the value of the pound could affect fuel costs following Brexit.

Immediately following the UK’s decision to leave the EU, the value of the pound experienced a fall of 20% against the dollar. This caused fuel prices to increase by around 10p per litre and experts to raise concern that Brexit could mark the end of cheap fuel in Britain. The combination of higher crude oil prices and the devaluation of the pound mean Britain should expect higher fuel prices become the norm.

Electric Charging Hubs

You may know that the market of electric vehicles has been criticised since the mobile was launched.  This has been due to a lack of EV charging points raising concern for many drivers, but could a transition towards electric and hybrid vehicles see us eventually wave goodbye to traditional fuel?

Following in the footsteps of other countries around the globe, like New Zealand who are rolling out easier-to-find charging stations, in the past 12 months, the UK’s electric car charging infrastructure has evolved substantially to suit the lifestyles of many drivers with many more EV charger installation points appearing. The UK also has over 20 companies and organisations installing and running nationwide or regional electric car charging networks.

The UK’s electric car charging infrastructure has evolved substantially to suit the lifestyles of many drivers with many more EV charger installation points appearing.

BP have also stated that they would be adding an increased number of charging points for electric vehicles into their UK fuel stations within the first few months of 2018. Oil firms are also recognising the potential for growth into the battery-powered vehicle market. A decision that follows in the footsteps of their rival, Shell, who have already invested money in several electric car infrastructure companies to install charging points at their service stations. According to The Guardian, the British oil firm, BP, is also investing $5 million (£3.5 million) in the US firm Freewire Technologies, which will provide motorbike-sized charging units at forecourts to top up cars in half an hour.

Tufan Erginbilgic, chief executive of BP Downstream, commented: “EV charging will undoubtedly become an important part of our business, but customer demand and the technologies available are still evolving.”

A multimillion-pound deal with ChargePoint saw InstaVolt installing at least another 3,000 rapid charging points across fuel station forecourts across the UK. Some researchers have also claimed they could have developed an ‘instantly rechargeable’ method that recharges an electric battery in the same time as it would take to fill a gas tank – a solution to one of the biggest headaches of electric vehicles.

2017 turned out to be a record year worldwide. In November 2017, global figures hit three million for the number of electric vehicles collectively on the roads – with China proving to dominate the market. Whilst oil firms such as BP expect the electric market to continue to rise, they hope the oil demand is not seriously affected – by cutting themselves a slice of the electric vehicle charging cake though, firms are covering their back if traditional oil demand does take a dip in line with the government’s plans to reduce harmful emissions and cut back on crude oil prices.

While fuel’s cost looks like it’ll be uncertain for the foreseeable, it appears that both the high fuel prices and efforts to improve the UK’s air quality will cause the EV market to increase and success is forecast to continue to surge in the years leading up to 2040.

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